D&D Rules Cyclopedia (Basic)

Whether you're a player or a Dungeon Master, the Dungeons & Dragons Rules Cyclopedia is now the comprehensive sourcebook you need for the original fantasy roleplaying game! For ages 12 and up, the Cyclopedia contains the compete game system and hundreds of features, including the following:

All the rules from the D&D boxed set series, including Basic, Expert, Companion, and Masters

Guidelines to develop and play characters from levels 1-36

Comprehensive lists of weaponry and equipment

Expansion rules including optional skills and talents

An overview of the Known World and the HOLLOW WORLD game setting, the official D&D campaign world; and Rules to convert D&D games and characters into AD&D 2nd edition game statistics and back again

Fully compatible with the new DUNGEONS & DRAGONS Boxed Set, this volume allows players the full scope of fantasy role-playing from dungeons to the Outer Planes. Now, more than ever, the DUNGEON & DRAGONS game is ready and waiting for you.

*****

Product History

The Dungeons & Dragons Rules Cyclopedia (1991), compiled and developed by Aaron Allston was the triumphant finale to the BECMI edition of D&D (1983-85). It was published in November 1991.

The End of Basic D&D. By 1991, Basic D&D was TSR's longest running roleplaying line. TSR traced the history of the game back to the release of the original D&D (1974). Even if you don't count that, the first game labeled as Basic D&D - the J. Eric Holmes Basic Set (July 1977) - appeared five months prior to the release of AD&D's Monster Manual (December 1977). It had since undergone two major revisions: the Tom Moldvay D&D Basic Set (1981), which was part of the B/X release, and which kicked off Basic D&D in its modern form; and the the Frank Mentzer D&D Basic Rules Set (1983), which was the first book in the BECMI revision.

Basic D&D had sold incredibly well at first, back in the late 70s and early 80s. Thanks in large part to the extensive publicity that D&D received from the James Egbert affair, new players were flocking to try out the game, and most of them went to TSR's introductory game - Basic D&D. That interest was in large part what led to the creation of the B/X and BECMI editions of the game, each of which expanded Basic D&D to allow for even more long-term play.

Unfortunately for Basic D&D, the pendulum began to swing toward AD&D as time went on. By the mid-80s, when popular books like Unearthed Arcana (1985) and Oriental Adventures (1985) were released, AD&D was clearly in ascendency, and Basic D&D was increasingly becoming the unwelcome relative who'd overstayed its welcome. The B-series ("Basic") adventures largely ended in 1985. The rest of the BECMI coded adventures finished up in 1987; other than the production of two final introductory adventures, B11: "King's Festival" (1989) and B12: "Queen's Harvest" (1989) a few years later. The "GAZ" line of Known World setting books then stumbled to a halt in 1991, with just one book published in each of the last years.

Although there were some new efforts like the "DDA" adventures (1990-91) and the Hollow World Setting (1990-92), it was clear that Basic D&D's flame was quickly fading.

A Black Box and a Hardcover Book. TSR tried to revive Basic D&D one last time in 1991 with a pair of new rules releases. The first was The New Easy to Master Dungeons & Dragons Game (1991), called alternatively the "Black Box edition," the "fifth edition," and "ten-seventy" (its product code, 1070) internally at TSR. It was a boxed D&D set that TSR described as "the first truly introductory version" of the game (as they had with every other "Basic" version of the game). The Black Box used cards to teach the game, something that had been advocated by Lorraine Williams based on the SRA reading programs (1957).

The Black Box is reported to have sold quickly and well. Approximately a half-million copies were purchased worldwide. It was also supplemented by a set of adventures that were almost boardgame-like with their colorful dungeon maps and figures. Unfortunately, the Black Box had one problem, the same problem that D&D "Basic" sets always had: it was limited in level, though it actually went up to 5th level, a bit higher than Basic's 3rd-level standard.

This limitation dovetailed nicely into TSR's other major plan for Basic D&D in 1991. Though the BECMI set of Basic D&D rules had always been well received, everyone thought it was quite troublesome to go through seven booklets totaling 368 pages when trying to track down a specific spell or magic item. Thus TSR decided to compile all of the rules into one hardcover book. The Rules Cyclopedia was the result - and it also offered somewhere for the Black Box players to go when they finished with fifth level.

Ironically, this was reportedly the exact same setup that Gygax had planned for the J. Eric Holmes Basic Set and also for AD&D, way back in 1977.

The Compilation. The Rules Cyclopedia is a compilation of the D&D Basic Rules Set (1983), the D&D Expert Rules Set (1983), the D&D Companion Rules (1984), and the D&D Master Rules (1985). It contains not only the rules from those boxed sets, but also the monsters, making the Cyclopedia one of two great sources for Basic D&D monsters, the other being the Creature Catalog (1986, 1993). Rules for skills and magic item creation from the "GAZ" Gazetteers (1987-91) are also included, making the Cyclopedia a truly massive compilation of about a decade's worth of Basic D&D rules.

The Immortals Rules (1986) are notably not included in the Cyclopedia, although it does contain seven pages from the Master Rules that include basic information for immortals, including rules on PCs ascending to those lofty ranks.

Rules on jousting in tournaments and on artifacts were also left out of the Cyclopedia.

Not an Introductory Book! Unlike every other iteration of Basic D&D, this one was not intended to be an introductory roleplaying book. It was instead a reference for Basic D&D play, which matched TSR's thinking about the AD&D 2e rules.

Expanding the Known World. The Cyclopedia doesn't expand the Known World in any notable way, but it does include a rather impressive atlas, featuring 16 full color maps, including the maps from the Gazetteers and the world maps from the Master Rules and the Hollow World Campaign Set (1990).

Future History. The Black Box rules and the Rules Cyclopedia got some joint support in the form of the "Thunder Rift" series of low-level adventures (1992-93). The Rules Cyclopedia also was supplemented with a few boxed releases, the most notable of which was Wrath of the Immortals (1992), a new set of immortals rules.

However, after the Black Box was revised one more time as The Classic Dungeons & Dragons Game (1994), all support for the line ended. After 22 years (or 19 if you prefer), Basic D&D was finally dead.

About the Creators. Though lots of people worked on the Rules Cyclopedia, the two most notable creators are Frank Mentzer, who wrote all the original boxes, and Aaron Allston, who led the Cyclopedia project. Mentzer had left TSR for New Infinities back in 1986, which was likely why he wasn't directly involved in this project. Allston didn't work for TSR at all, but instead had been a freelance RPG writer since 1983. Though he only tended to write one or two books for TSR each year, by the early 90s he was writing the biggest releases for Basic D&D, including the Hollow World Campaign Setting, the D&D Rules Cyclopedia, and Wrath of the Immortals.

About the Product Historian

The history of this product was researched and written by Shannon Appelcline, the editor-in-chief of RPGnet and the author of Designers & Dragons - a history of the roleplaying industry told one company at a time. Please feel free to mail corrections, comments, and additions to shannon.appelcline@gmail.com.

Any news about when this will get a POD release ? Have an old PDF but really want it in print for the gaming table.

Geoffrey WMay 19, 2017 5:04 am UTC

Incredibly unlikely. If WotC wanted to re-release it in print, they'd just print it like they did with the anniversary editions of AD&D, D&D3, etc.

Cory DAugust 17, 2016 7:33 pm UTC

Is the index/table of contents hyperlinked?

January 28, 2016 6:02 pm UTC

Many years ago, I bought a PDF of this from somewhere -- I have a vague memory of Wizards selling some of them directly. It's about an 80MB PDF. Is this one of substantially better quality, to justify my re-purchasing a book I already own?

Anne TApril 23, 2016 3:03 pm UTC

PURCHASER

The file size for this one is 164.18 MB (see the upper right sidebar). I do know that they have rescanned and/or cleaned up many of the originally offered PDFs, so your chances sound good. But it really depends on how much you use it, and if you had any issues with the version you had.

Rob BApril 04, 2015 2:01 pm UTC

PURCHASER

Hi all,

I have an older version of the Cyclopedia - probably close to 10 years old and about 18mb. How different is this new version? Is it worth getting the newer version? How well does it it print? Has anyone tried to get this printed - such as LULU?

Thanks,
Rob

Petterson CNovember 02, 2015 2:23 am UTC

PURCHASER

Hi Rob B,

Kindly read my review on this product.

jason NFebruary 14, 2015 5:44 pm UTC

PURCHASER

165 MB? Really? That's the best we can do on this?

Petterson CNovember 02, 2015 2:25 am UTC

PURCHASER

Hi jason N,

This is the best so far that we can get from an old book scanned for digital consumption. You don't, of course, expect a great quality in a retina display ipad.

Bruce HFebruary 13, 2015 4:33 pm UTC

PURCHASER

I was told that there is indeed a version that has bookmarks and such, sold at the same price on RPGNow, but this one does not.

jason NFebruary 14, 2015 5:48 pm UTC

PURCHASER

Im looking at it right now, and it is indeed bookmarked by chapter and sub-chapter sections. Not only that, the text is selectable and can be copy/pasted & searched.
The file size is a bit big, but overall what I'm seeing here is a pretty good quality.

Bruce HFebruary 14, 2015 6:29 pm UTC

PURCHASER

No idea what happened. I re-downloaded and the file is ok now, though a bit too fuzzy for my taste. But the bookmarks are ok.

Bruce HFebruary 13, 2015 2:59 am UTC

PURCHASER

This PDF doesn't appear to have any bookmarks and seems of poor quality. It's hardly worth the few dollars to purchase it.

Ronald CFebruary 13, 2015 2:36 pm UTC

I agree. No errata incorporated, either. It's just a mediocre quality scan of the book. Nostalgia cash-grab.

Matthew GFebruary 13, 2015 8:06 pm UTC

PURCHASER

The PDF does indeed have bookmarks and the scan looks really clean to my eyes. I purchased one of the older scans of this years ago before they were pulled from availability, and the contrast in the quality of scans is stark.

Nathanael CFebruary 13, 2015 10:57 pm UTC

PURCHASER

What are you talking about? There are bookmarks, quite clearly. And while the file size is pretty huge, it still displays quite well across all my devices.

This is an incredible book for those who want to go back to the basics for roleplay. It has all the special rules for a ton of situations for you to geek out with and remember your early days in the hobby! I can't say enough how much I enjoy having th [...]

This is a good scan of the product. The text is clear, and I cannot see any evidence of anti-aliasing or blurring of the letters when zoomed in. These two PDFs work fine on my old, underpowered tablet, zoomed in on my phone, and on my Kindle (not all [...]

This was never my favorite version of D&D (since I'm not a huge fan of racial classes), but I did really enjoy it before I got into AD&D. The fact that the two are almost completely rules- compatible was a huge help. It didn't take very much to [...]

This is the essential complete volume of Basic D&D. All rules are compiled into one handy book. If WOTC tried this in 5e or in the future 6e, I would certainly buy it for its portability, handiness, and critical role. [...]

One of the best versions of Dungeons & Dragons. The book is well written with detail and has everything inside (rules, monsters, equipment, classes, etc) to get started playing. If that is not enough the site has lots of old school legendary advent [...]

These products were created by scanning an original printed edition. Most older books are in scanned image format because original digital layout files never existed or were no longer available from the publisher.

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